On Sat, Apr 22, 2000 at 02:37:24PM -0500, Ken MacLeod wrote:
> Tom Harding <tomh@thinlink.com> writes:
>
> > > We've been under pressure from many sources, including the advisory
> > > board, to address the threat of fragmentation of and investigate the
> > > exciting opportunities in the area of XML protocols.
> >
> > I took a very minimalist approach to this problem in an internet
> > draft that has since expired. There's a link to it at
> > http://www.thinlink.com/xp.
>
> Thanks for posting that. I had a link to the XP draft but no pointer
> to a lasting copy.
>
> (nudge to Eric) I think I have a facet that helps distinguish
> protocols and formats (serializations): "envelope" or "generic
> envelope".
>
> Much of what we've been calling "protocol" has been _usage_ or
> _application_ of envelope format, rather than any specific definition
> of an envelope format. For example, SOAP defines a format for
> specifying envelopes, and then _only_ one usage (RPC) of that format.
Perhaps separating them, like the "non-XML protocols", would be the
most clear way to help apples and apples comparisons.
> P.S. I notice that a lot of the facets I'm describing are tending to
> be enumerations (has to a degree) where Eric's have been booleans (has
> or doesn't have), is this a good thing?
I think the Serialization enums prove the utility of your suggestions.
--
-eric
(eric@w3.org)